walking miracle, my skin
by Maggie the Cat
Summary: out of the ash i rise with my red hair and i eat men like air


"Wake up, Jeannie."

Jean made a noise of protest and pushed her nose deeper into her pillow. "Too early," she mumbled. But then her pillow was tugged away, and she sat up with a frown as Scott reflexively re-fluffed it and tossed it back down on the bed.

"Sorry," he said, "but we've got too much to do." He leaned in and kissed her. Jean shifted eagerly forward when she felt one of his hands slide around her back to press gently between her shoulder blades.

"Mmmmm," she purred, tipping her head back the way she knew he liked, so her red, red hair spilled across the back of his hand and tickled his knuckles. Scott had always loved her hair. She found that unbearably sad and incredibly touching at the same time; there was something so intimate about him finding her hair lovely even in the midst of his world of inescapable red.

She'd never talked to him about it, but she knew how he felt. Even before the telepathy, she'd usually been able to discern Scott's emotions and thoughts. It was one of those things that were almost cliched when it came to relationships, being so much on the same page. Other people's opinions had never bothered Jean. In an unstable and uncertain world, there was a certain comfort in knowing another person this thoroughly. So thoroughly that she knew all the little things that Scott liked best, knew what to do in order for him to do all the things that _she_ liked best, an intricate and loving ballet.

Scott kissed her proffered throat, then browsed his way up along her jawline and to her earlobe, where he gave a few licks and then snaked his tongue into her ear.

Jean jerked in his arms, frowning. "No," she murmured, "not that. The back of the neck, the collarbone."

"Sorry," Scott said again in a flat tone. His hand moved up her spine to cradle the back of her head, tangle in her hair and pull so that her chest arched forward to meet his kisses along her collarbone. Jean moaned, legs falling open on the bed; the man kissing his way down to her breasts flickered briefly into blue skin and red hair but by that point Jean's eyes were already closed.

* * *

They lived the quiet sort of life that they'd always dreamed of -- the small town, the quaint little house, the garage where Scott tinkered with the motorcycle that would never run again and the flower garden where Jean attempted fabulous exotic plants and ended up growing hollyhocks and canterbury bells year after year. They had a garbage disposal and good china for when guests came over and a respectable sedan, and there was just one thing missing. 

Jean tried not to dwell on it. They'd talked and yelled and argued and agreed to postpone the discussion for a while, but she found that in her quiet moments her mind would wander there and she'd feel that womb-deep yearning once more. It started to get so the more Jean tried not to think about it, the more her body would remind her. Eventually it came so often that Scott found her in one of her worse moments in the spare room, curled up on the big rocking chair there and weeping so hard it made her stomach hurt. He stood in the doorway for a moment before coming over to crouch next to her and ask, "What, Jean? What is it, honey?"

"I just ..." she began, "I just wish ..." A fresh wave of tears overtook her, and Scott's arms were just going around her shoulders when Jean managed to get out, "-- I wish we could have a baby, Scott. I want that baby."

He froze in mid-embrace and rocked back on his heels, staring at her silently for a long time. Then he stood up.

"You know we can't," he said. "You know that's impossible."

"No, I don't!" Jean pushed her hair from her face, resentment flaring through her. "It's not impossible for _me_, Scott, only for you. If you really cared about me, you'd understand how important this is. Not just for me, for _us_. For our _family_."

Scott didn't even look at her. "I said no," he told her, voice cold and remote. "We agreed we're not going to discuss this."

"_You_ agreed," Jean shot back, although she knew that was unfair. "I never stopped thinking about it."

"That doesn't matter. It's not happening, so stop whining about it and act like a goddamn grown woman."

The chill of his tone cracked Jean's last bit of reserve and she stood, shoving Scott's shoulder, yanking at him so he'd turn around and face her. "This is not how it goes!" she said, so loud in the dark and still room. Scott's lip curled and his skin got tight and crinkled up around his eyes, and Jean pointed at him and said even louder, "no! No! That's all _wrong_!" and even in all that shadow she saw Scott's jaw clench and one of his hands flex into a tense, angry fist. The sight of that fist made hot fire spark in her brain, in her mouth, in her belly, and she said, "And don't even think of _that_, either." Her own voice sounded rough and hollow now, charred. Underneath the rage she was still cognizant enough for that to register, and for her to feel sorrow over it. "Don't you ever dare raise a hand to me, Scott."

He was shaking, all over. That was wrong too but Jean watched him closely and after a moment Scott said, through his teeth: "I'm sorry, Jean. I guess I don't know how to do the act right enough for you."

Jean reached for him. Scott shook her off and left the room, left her alone, and Jean raised a numb hand to press to her chest. Her pulse was racing and her fingertips pressed hard against her skin, cold, cold.

* * *

She could hardly believe how quickly things fell apart after that. 

What hurt most of all was that she was willing to forgive Scott for almost hitting her that time in the spare room, despite her better judgement. She was willing to make that small sacrifice for the sake of their relationship. But Scott just grew more distant, more standoffish and sullen and repulsive, and Jean could hardly stand it.

Wanting a baby wasn't a crime, was it? Why shouldn't she want an extension of them, of their love and their life together? How could they disagree on such a desperately important thing?

After one more night in a countless string of them where they lay in their bed turned out from each other, Jean made a decision.

* * *

A tremor spasmed through Scott's mouth and cheek. Jean thought she'd never seen him look so ugly. 

"You can't try to talk me out of it this time," she said firmly, folding her arms. "I've made up my mind. If you won't cooperate with me to make our baby, I'll just have to adopt."

Scott's teeth showed in a snarl. "You have got to be kidding me," he growled. "Listen up and listen well, you fucking lunatic -- this is it. I'm out. I'm not gonna put up with this goddamn insanity one more fucking minute, one more fucking _second_." He reached out, faster than Jean might have expected, and grabbed her by the throat, thumb pressing down hard.

"Stop it," she gasped, clawing at his hand, his wrist. "Scott, please--"

He shook her once, fast, and leaned in so close she could smell his skin. "I've had enough," he told her. "You want to carry on with this useless mockery of a life, you do it alone. I'm done with this."

The awful stifling pressure on Jean's throat eased up and fell away as Scott stepped back, and Jean felt hot, humiliated tears well up and run down her face like so much thin blood. "Why are you doing this to me?" she wailed, anger battling the hurt in her voice. "Don't you love me anymore?"

Scott looked at her. "I never loved you," he said. "Fuck, you know that." Jean sobbed and Scott said in that voice that was all wrong, "You're gonna have to either loosen up on the psionic tether or just kill me, babe." He reached up, reached up to curl his fingers around the rims of his ruby quartz glasses, and Jean blurted, "no, nono nononono Scott you _can't_--" before he tore them from his face --

* * *

**before**

_"Wake up."_

_Raven's eyes snap open faster than she's ready for, and she stares with awful clarity at the dark red high-heeled boots that dominate her field of vision. She's lying on the floor and one naked hip is aching, the side of her face scraped. The boots shift with elegant, disdainful impatience. They walk towards her, sideways, and the demanding toe of one prods sharply against her cheekbone._

_"Get up."_

_Ordinarily she wouldn't; ordinarily she'd balk at being told what to do. But she's bleary, unfocused, and she wants to give herself a few moments to formulate a plan, so she curls one leg up painfully and pushes herself upright. Staring at the boots gives her something to concentrate on, at least, while she collects herself._

_"Stand."_

_And before she can consciously do anything, the long muscles in her thighs flex and contract and she's lurching to her feet under a power not her own, tottering unsteadily. Jean Grey belongs to the high-heeled boots, and Raven would laugh if her throat wasn't full of sand. She remembers this woman with the scent of pine and cedar and that underlying note of thick decay, this woman and the forest and Erik and all of it, really._

_"Nobody knows how to stay dead anymore," Raven manages to say, voice grating. "It's endemic of mutantkind. Tacky."_

_Jean Grey tilts her head, gives a sidelong and considering look. Her mouth is crueler than Raven remembers._

_"But you aren't mutantkind anymore," Jean Grey finally says. "Are you, Mystique?"_

_Her first instinct is to land a kick across the bitch's face, but she knows what kind of mutie Jean Grey is and she doesn't humiliate herself by trying. Instead she lifts her head and slants an insolent look down her nose. Xavier's set are notoriously well-mannered and easily thrown off by a certain impenetrable arrogance; Raven's cultivated it well, and Erik had a natural reserve of it that -- well, she isn't going to think about Erik._

_What in the hell could crazy Jean Grey want with her, anyway?_

_Raven opens her mouth to say something smart, something tough and villainous, but before she knows it Jean Grey is pressing that hot, cruel mouth against hers and biting down on Raven's lip. She can move enough within the telekinetic bonds to kiss back, push forward a little, raise her hands a fraction when the other woman wraps her arms around Raven and kisses harder. There's fire snapping between them and Jean's red hair all around, and for what's possibly the first time Raven sees the Phoenix for the glorious, terrifying creature she really is. Jean's hands slip around ravenously, on Raven's breasts, on her own, luxuriating in their flesh; she slides her lush body against Raven's until she's found the right place for herself and then rubs and rubs and throws her pretty head back while Raven grinds her teeth and feels dizzy from the searing bursts going off inside her. Raven has long since made peace with the parts of herself that revel in exactly this sort of thing, dirty wrong sex in positions of compromise, but even still when she comes she bites down on her cry so hard that she nips her tongue bloody._

_Jean winds herself around Raven's taut and shuddering body, holding her close. She leans in and nuzzles Raven's ear, and whispers, "You can do that to me all the time, Mystique. I know you liked it. And I can give you your mutation back, I'm powerful enough, you know that I am, fire and life incarnate, yes. All you have to do--"_

_She stops there and pulls back to press her mouth against the corner of Raven's. "All you have to do," Jean breathes, "is be Scott."_

* * *

Jean stared in horror through the psi-shimmer of the telekinetic shield she'd instinctively thrown around herself, stared at the yellow eyes behind Scott's shades and moaned out loud when Scott himself shimmered and shook out into long, lithe blue limbs and fright-red hair. 

"No," Jean said, sounding petulant to her own ears. "I don't want this. I want Scott."

"I'm the only Scott here," Mystique said. "And even with him dead that's one too many." Her tone was casual and insulting, but Jean knew better; Mystique was mentally riffling at top speed through all her possible escape options. Still, it wouldn't hurt to let her think she'd gotten the upper hand for a moment.

"Don't you dare say things like that about him!" Jean shrieked, and flung Mystique against the wall. She rose up into the air, savouring the molten electric course of the Phoenix power surging through her, and regarded the woman slumped across the room; there were moments of lucidity, for certain, when both Jean and the Phoenix creature were aware of the charade of the past while, and this perhaps was one of them.

"I'm not crazy, you know," Jean said gently to Mystique, who only looked at her with those disturbing eyes. "I'm just fixing things. As much as I can."

Mystique thumbed blood from a cut over one eye. "Your idea of fixing things and most people's idea of crazy dovetail real nice," she spat. "Give it a few minutes and you'll be back to telepathically keeping me locked up in your dead boyfriend's body."

"A few more minutes while you figure out how to defeat me, you mean," Jean said, and with a flick of her fingers Mystique was hanging in the air in front of her, arms and legs splayed stiffly. "I wonder what I should do about that."

Mystique's throat worked a couple of times and then she said, "You could always let me go now that I'm no use to you. I'm not part of Magneto's group anymore, so no threat to you and yours-- who, by the way, would probably love to know you're alive."

Jean felt true, pure anger at that. "You don't know _anything_ about what my friends would feel," she said, "so don't presume to lecture me." Mystique smiled at her, a broad and lazy smile underneath heavy-lidded eyes, and after a few livid seconds Jean smiled too.

"You're right about one thing, though." She tossed her hair and looked Mystique up and down. "You're no use to me anymore. And that means you don't need what I gave you back."

The smile fell from Mystique's face as fast as if Jean had slapped it off. "Oh, god," she gasped, "no, don't take my powers from me! Don't! After all this time, what I've done for you--"

Jean nodded. "I'll always be grateful. And I'm sure Scott would be too, since you kept me sane--" she ignored Mystique's hysterical bark of derision, "--but I'm sorry, it just wouldn't be right. And X-Men always do what's right."

Red fire began to twist and coil around Jean, the high painful thrum of the Phoenix manifesting itself through every molecule of her body. She made a high, keening noise of pleasure as she surrendered to that unbelievable power, using it to sort through and identify what she wanted out of the other woman's genes. She had learned so much. The Professor would be proud to see how far she'd come. Scott would have loved to see her as glorious as this.

As she gathered ropes and strands of red-laced energy in her elegant hands to begin unraveling the mutated genes of Mystique's body, Jean caught a scent in the air that she knew, one that she savoured as she started her work. It was the sharp scent of devastating loss; faint cedar and pine, laced with the sweet rot of underlying decay.


End file.
